The Triple Goddess

by Stephanie Hudson

  “As you still do now,” he said then his eyes lowered in sadness but it was not before Draven had seen where he was looking at…or more like…who.

  Draven turned around after letting go of his brother and looked straight at me like we were the only two people in the room.

  “Keira?” He said my name in a breath and tears filled my eyes at hearing it. It was amazing how one name could hold so much emotion…defence…guilt…shame… and even love, but what did my name hold for Draven, I was too emotional to tell. Maybe all of these things, maybe none, but one thing I did read in his eyes was shock and that brought me back to my situation like a cold hard slap across the face.

  “Pip, get me out of here!” I said in nothing short of a plea and Draven’s eyes turned from softy holding my gaze to stormy resentment at hearing these words. I looked away before my will crumbled but one look at Pip, said she was torn.

  “You will stay, Keira!” Draven’s voice quickly went from amazed to authoritative in seconds but when I shouted out Pip’s name it changed again.

  “Keira, NO! Don’t do this!” This time it was in pleading and my last response looked like it hit him the hardest.

  “No Draven, I have heard enough! Just let me GO!” I shouted and just as I and Pip started to fade I heard Draven’s last roar followed by a word that sent my mind, body and soul into a shuddering mess.

  “NEVER!”

  I collapsed back into myself and I noticed Pip do the same, only now she was panting on the floor. Tears were streaming down my cheeks and I couldn’t stop my hands from shaking at the energy that still coursed under my skin like a current of supernatural electricity. I placed a shaky hand on Pip’s shoulder and she flinched at the contact.

  “Pip…are you alright?” I asked my friend who looked just as shaken up as I did.

  “Y…yeah…I think so…I…I mean…wow, I have never, ever, ever, in all my years…but wow.”

  “What…what is it?” I asked not knowing whether the reason for her broken sentence was a good thing or not.

  “Defied a King…HA! Toot’s, I defied a King! A KING!” She shot up and started to jump around the room leaving me feeling like I had taken crazy pills! Christ, even her pompoms were flying off her skirt! I stood up trying to think of a way to calm her enough for her to explain.

  “Pip? Are you sure you’re alright?” I asked feeling like any minute she was going to go supernova on me and then I would find myself answering to Adam…and that was so not good.

  Speaking of Adam, as if on cue, he walked in the room….well walked is putting it lightly, more like raced would be a better explanation. He even skidded when taking a corner of the room too quickly. He spotted Pip still dancing around in circles, laughing her little green locks off and I saw all the air leave him in a whoosh. Relief washed over his stern features at seeing his wife overcome with such happiness and when she noticed him finally her eyes lit up.

  “Nerdy!” She called him before taking a running jump and blast-off, she was in his arms. His glasses twisted and his hair tumbled in every direction thanks to his wife’s erratic little kisses that she was covering him in.

  “Pipper?” He said softy but when she wouldn’t stop he tried for something sterner.

  “Winifred!” At this she finally stilled and she looked up at him with her hands still clutched firmly behind his neck.

  “My darling wife, as much as it pleases me to see you so happy, please put me out of my misery and explain.” She smiled, then readjusted his glasses for him. She jumped out of his arms and came over to stand next to me before slapping her arm round my shoulders and pulling me closer to her.

  “Me and Keira defied the King.” She said proudly and Adam looked like he had swallowed a bug. However, instead of going mad and screaming in what looked like a close emotion that could possibly make an appearance, he just calmly cleared his throat and pushed his glasses further up his nose.

  “Please explain what you mean by that exactly.” He said causing Pip to start rocking back and to on her heels like a child hiding a secret.

  “The King wanted me to send a vision of Keira back to him, but considering he’s been a really bad boyfriend… Hugh Hefner style….” She felt me flinch and turned to whisper ‘sorry’ before carrying on.

  “….then she refused, but she came to see what he had to say but you know when I do that thing…remember the bombing in Rastenburg, East Prussia. Well anyway, same deal but then lovely Keira here was just too damned angry and wanted to be seen at the end. Well, then the King goes bat shit crazy right! So when he orders me to keep Keira there we just cut and run, thus completing my epic tale of how an Imp managed to defy a King.” She said this last part in a low voice, mimicking a deep manly voice that could have been a piss take on Draven.

  Adam rolled his eyes before closing them as he processed the ‘epic’ story Pip had royally named it. I looked at Pip and she was actually chewing on her bottom lip looking nervous, awaiting Adam’s approval.

  “So let me get this perfectly straight, Keira, you didn’t want to stay with the King…am I right?” He still hadn’t opened his eyes and without looking he held up his hand to stop Pip from answering.

  “No, I didn’t.” I answered in a way that I would have if I had been caught fighting in the playground at school and this was now the headmaster’s office I was stood in.

  “And he knew this?” This time he looked straight at me and seeing that gaze I could feel the power that lay dormant but waiting under his ‘Everyday Joe’ persona.

  “Oh trust me, I made it clear!” I said, still trying to deal with my mixed feelings on the matter.

  “Very well then. I see not a King ordering his subjects, but a man ordering his lover to stay when he has given her no reasons to do so. You were right in your actions. Come here my naughty little Squeak.” At this she ‘yippeed’ and ran at him full pelt. He caught her again and she started to rub herself up and down against him like a purring cat.

  “Will you be alright on your own for a bit, I need to go and screw some sexy brains out but I will be back for you later…ok?” She asked as Adam was devouring her neck in a bite that looked more painful than arousing but if Pip’s moans were anything to go by then looks were clearly deceiving.

  “I will be fine,” I said knowing the inevitable breakdown that would consume me when left alone but this time I welcomed it. Adam started to take her to the door and I remembered what I really wanted to say as I ran round the edge of the room’s divider and called her name just as they went round the corner. I looked down thinking I was too late but then I saw just Pip’s head pop around the door frame where Adam was still holding her. I couldn’t help but laugh a little at how comical it looked.

  “Yeah Toots?”

  “I…I just wanted to say…Thank you. You didn’t have to do that for me but you did and I just wanted you to know…I will never forget it, Winifred.” The smile she gave me brought a light to my soul that had already started drowning by darkness. But this girl…this little Imp had brought me more than just an impossible friendship…she had brought me truth, a truth that had the faintest glimmer of hope surrounding it. No matter how faint that hope was, it was there all the same.

  “I know you won’t, just as I will never forget the way you stood up to the most powerful leader of our existence for a little Imp like me. I will never forget, my friend… Keira.” She finished with a wink and I filled with warmth at hearing the first time she said my name, like I had done the same with her. She disappeared back around the corner and I heard her excited giggles until a door slammed shut down the hall.

  As my friend left me, all the emotional day’s events came colliding to the forefront of my mind. I collapsed onto the bed and curled my body up in a foetal position to continue once again how I had started the day…feeling confused, lost and hurt. Emotions that consumed me until my tears ran dry for the second time and in-keeping with the theme, I passed out in exhaustion. But unlike the circle I had come
back to, something different happened.

  “Keira!” My name was spoken by the only being I ever wanted to hand over control of my dreams to….

  Draven.

  Chapter 29

  Draven’s Storm

  Ba doom, ba doom, ba doom. The beating in my chest played to a rhythm of death as I ran for my life. Something was chasing me and from the sounds of the growls coming from close by, I wasn’t just being chased…no… I was also being played with.

  The forest floor bit into the skin on the bottom of my feet as I ran further and further into the unknown. Branches grabbed out at me as though they were aiding the beast’s attempts at slowing me down. But I couldn’t stop…I must not stop. I kept looking behind me to try and judge how close I was to being ripped apart but every time I looked back I would lose precious seconds by slowing my senses into being more careful.

  My thin white dress snagged on a bush I jumped over and ripped all the way up to my thigh. Even what I was wearing was against me. I tried to process what events had brought me to this point and the only answer I received was the beast’s growls as a reminder. That one word screamed through my brain, vibrating around every corner in a half man, half demonic roar….NEVER!

  Draven’s warning had come through in a clear cut message. He would never let me go and I was running now to find out why. Only the beast behind me didn’t want me to know why….it just wanted me.

  Another few steps brought me closer to the end of the forest, as I could see the night’s moon shining through the patch of trees ahead. I was almost at a clearing but what lay ahead for me I didn’t yet know. Would the beast stop playing with its prey and just take me for the final kill?

  I could almost feel its breath on my bare legs where the skirt of my dress had been sacrificed to the forest. It was gaining on me and I could feel it thinking when was best to pounce, when best to finish what it had started and take what it wanted from my body. I could almost hear its thoughts, its pleasure in the idea of the feast it would soon be tasting. It wanted me, without one shred of a doubt but how it would take me left me quaking inside. I didn’t know whether the trembling in my blood was making me run quicker or just the adrenaline that kept my body going was being powered by something greater.

  “Not going to make it, little rabbit!” The voice warned through the trees in a rough whisper that echoed off the rough bark from every tree in my path. This made me push for that extra boost as the light of the clearing started to grow brighter, my escape and my sanctuary was so close I could almost feel the light touching my skin. It would save me, it would save me, I repeated over and over in my head but the beast could hear me and responded, causing the trees to shake.

  “I am your sanctuary, little rabbit. I am your saviour and I am your HOME!” It shouted this last part and I felt the earth ripple beneath my feet. I looked up to see the leaves that couldn’t hold on through its demand rain down around me. I swallowed down the fear and churned it into more energy directed at my survival. I was nearly there…I was nearly there…Just a bit more. I was so close …I was…I was…

  Trapped!

  I watched in horror as six shadows came in line with the bluish moon lit behind them, all of which were standing there waiting for me to run straight into their trap.

  Wolves. I was now trapped by six wolves. I froze as they started to fan out around me. Black and huge, being twice the size of regular wolves, they looked as though driven straight from the gates of Hell. All with long snouts that showcased row after row of bloody fangs that didn’t look as though they would all fit. These were not the majestic creatures that ruled the forest and sang at the moon in howls of dominance. No, these were not even of this earth and knew nothing of its living beauty. These creatures knew only one thing and they relished in delight of it. They knew how to hunt, how to terrify and how to kill. And now…they would soon know the taste of my fear.

  One coming closer still shook out its black matted pelt and its eyes started to change from clouded blue to deep vein crimson. As those eyes of death locked onto me I started to back away, knowing I was just extending the inevitable. But then something different started to happen.

  The wolves behind this one started to whine and back away. It was like they saw something that had them spooked and as they began to slowly retreat they snapped at each other in frustration. It was only when backing away further that I started to realise why. A pair of steel bands crossed over my upper body and my back hit a solid force. All the air left my lungs and the feeling of being trapped had me panicking inside. I couldn’t move and the wolf that was closest was weighing up the situation. I was so close to being his kill but the beast behind me had me caught in his grasp finally and didn’t want to let me go.

  “Caught at last, little rabbit.” The demonic voice spoke in my ear and its words didn’t stop there. It travelled down my spine like caressing fingertips received from a lover. The wolf in front came closer still and growled, making its lips curl back as it bared its triple row of teeth at us. They were crisscrossed over one another and it looked as though this thing could chew its way through barbed wire if it wanted to.

  However the beast at my back merely laughed deep and grounded as though the act of this Hellhound was nothing but a bit of entertainment. However the wolf didn’t appreciate the lack of fear and I felt the spray from his mouth as it snapped out just missing my leg by inches. This finally got the beast’s attention.

  “MINE!” It roared above my head and tightened its hold of me until just before the point of pain. The beast then growled in anger and the wolf started trying to retreat like the rest of its pack. Unfortunately for it though it didn’t get very far without first being punished. Its eyes started to turn deathly white and the end of its fur start to smoke as if being set on fire by an invisible flame. It rolled over and over setting the forest floor alight with its actions until one final snarl from behind me finished everything. The wolf fell to the ground and everything around it turned to white ash that the wind picked up and took along its way. The wolf remained still for a few moments and the chest against my back regained some calm for its breathing slowed.

  “Be gone with you, Gytrash.” At hearing this, the wolf got up and staggered off into the mist that now surrounded the clearing ahead, leaving me and the beast alone in a forest full of abandoned life.

  “Why do you run from me, little rabbit? Why run when I will always catch you?” The voice started off as a Demon but finished as that of a man. That of…

  Draven.

  On hearing his voice my feet fell beneath me but his arms held me up like an unrelenting force. He was the beast. The one hunting me in my dreams. For I knew now what this was and had always been…a reality of my situation transformed into a dream. Draven was always there, was always going to be there and no words of mine would make it otherwise. He was never going to let me go, just as deep down I knew I would never do the same. The reality of this dream hit me and I spoke my suspicions out loud.

  “You’re manipulating my dreams?” I felt his head lower so his lips could be closer to my neck. I felt the contact he made there all the way to my bones and I shuddered, still with his unbreakable hold on me.

  “Yes and you continued to run from those dreams, turning me into a beast when all I wanted to do was find you, to… have you.” He sounded hurt but that changed with the last two words, ones said in a possessive growl that was only enhanced by the hold of his hand at the column of my neck. He wasn’t hurting me but I could feel the strength in his fingertips that held me in their unyielding grip.

  “But…why?” I asked feeling the words that formed under his hand and in return I felt his lips smile under my ear. The hand he had free started to wander down my waist gathering thin material as it went. I swallowed hard at the feeling of being touched by such raw power.

  “Why? Explain this to me Keira…how is it that after all I have told you, after all I have confessed….” This last word rolled out of him in a hiss that
told me all I needed to know about his emotions, emotions he was trying desperately to hold in check, fighting for the control that he was so utterly used to having was the hardest thing for him to give into.

  “…explain to me why you run from me? Don’t you yet understand how that is not an option?” I closed my eyes at the stream of confusing emotions that hit me like a thunderbolt. Why was it that he was still doing this to me? Didn’t he already have who he wanted in his bed, yet his hand continued its journey south, igniting my flesh as he went.

  “You…you chose another!” I stammered out and his hand fisted in the last bit of material covering my womanly core.

  “No!” He growled in my ear making me tense up in his hold.

  “I chose only you, my little frightened bird, one whom so desperately wants to take flight, isn’t that so…you wish to fly away from me?” Before I could answer his hand dipped the last inches until he covered my bare and waiting sex. At the first feel of contact I moaned out my “Yes” making him growl.

  “Then a living cage I will keep you in!” He promised before spinning me round to face him and taking possession of my mouth. His lips commanded my own into a response and all my will to hold back broke with a resounding snap. As soon as our lips touched it was the start of something explosive and we both marvelled in it together.

  I couldn’t stop my hands from curling up to his shoulders to pull him impossibly closer still. I wanted him to feel my heart beating solely for him. I wanted him to feel each thud of my pulse that played to the rhythm he set just by having his hands on me. I wanted to fool myself and drown in the lost sensations that tugged at my vulnerability. I just…wanted….him.

  I could feel his hands almost shaking and then they would fist holding me closer until they stopped shaking. It was as if he was trying to hold onto me, afraid that I might finally float away this time without ever coming back. I could feel every solid inch of him pressing into me and molding me to fit his frame. Well, if this was his living cage then he could keep me here and never let me out, hell I would even swallow the key for him!